Lord! would men let me alone, And, pleasing a man's self, none other to What an over-happy one displease. O my beloved nymph, fair Dove, Upon thy flowery banks to lie, And view thy silver stream, The all of treachery I ever learned industriously to try! Such streams Rome's yellow Tiber cannot show, The Iberian Tagus, or Ligurian Po; Beloved Dove, with thee To vie priority; Nay, Tame and Isis, when conjoined, submit, And lay their trophies at thy silver feet. O my beloved rocks, that rise To awe the earth and brave the skies! Giddy with pleasure, to look down; And, from the vales, to view the noble heights above; O my beloved caves! from dog-star's heat, O thou, for whose soul-soothing quiet, turtles Passion their voices cooingly 'mong myrtles, What time thou wanderest at eventide Through sunny meadows, that outskirt the side Of thine enmossed realms! O thou, to whom Broad-leaved fig-trees even now foredoom Their ripened fruitage; yellow-girted bees Their golden honeycombs; our village leas Their fairest blossomed beans and poppied corn; The chuckling linnet its five young unborn, To sing for thee; low-creeping strawberries Their summer coolness; pent-up butterflies Their freckled wings; yea, the fresh-budding year All its completions-be quickly near, By every wind that nods the mountain pine, O forester divine! Thou, to whom every faun and satyr flies For willing service; whether to surprise The squatted hare while in half-sleeping fit; Or upward ragged precipices flit To save poor lambkins from the eagle's maw; Or by mysterious enticement draw Bewildered shepherds to their path again; Or to tread breathless round the frothy main, And gather up all fancifullest shells For thee to tumble into Naiads' cells, And, being hidden, laugh at their out-peep ing; Or to delight thee with fantastic leaping, O Hearkener to the loud-clapping shears, While ever and anon to his shorn peers And through whole solemn hours dost sit A ram goes bleating! Winder of the horn, and hearken The dreary melody of bedded reeds In desolate places, where dank moisture breeds The pipy hemlock to strange overgrowth, By all the trembling mazes that she ran, When snouted wild-boars, routing tender corn, Anger our huntsmen! Breather round our farms, To keep off mildews, and all weather harms! THE BELFRY PIGEON. 69 Oh, how my heart ran o'er with joy! I saw that all was good, And how we might glean up delight All round us, if we would! And many a wood-mouse dwelleth there, And all day long has work to do, THE BELFRY PIGEON. On the cross-beam under the Old South bell I love to see him track the street, The green shoots grow above their heads, And I often watch him as he springs, Circling the steeple with easy wings, Whatever is rung on that noisy bell- moon, When the sexton cheerly rings for noon, When the clock strikes clear at morning light, When the child is waked with "nine at night," When the chimes play soft in the Sabbath air, I would that, in such wings of gold, |